Fox Waitress, and Valkyrie

Chapter 25: A trio of battles

I'mmmmmmmmmmmmm Baaaaaaacccccckkkkkkkkkkkk

But seriously it's been WAY too long since I've updated this story. In all actuality, this story is nearing the stages of completion. After these recent string of fights, all I have left is the closer.

By that estimation there are about 6 chapters left. At this point however, there's not much actual story and plot left to write which is mainly why I've let this sit on the burner for so long.

I swear to you though that I will see this story through to completion.

Again, though sorry. I've let this story settle for far too long and I need to get this thing finished.

Alright enough of this gooey shhhhh show of emotions (name that reference)

Let's go!

…..

Kanna stared at the Suna kunoichi sitting on the perch, quickly going over her plan of attack. She knew that this girl used the wind as a weapon, but the only way she could attack would be a swing of that very heavy fan, so her attacks wouldn't be very fast.

Kanna smirked. "I told you I'm not letting you through."

Temari just smirked and reached for her giant fan. She quickly opened it and swung it at a quick speed causing a small tornado to form and attack the ground where Kanna stood. Kanna shook her head and quickly ran behind one of the trees.

She then put her hands together in a cross and summoned a few bunshins. She didn't need anything sophisticated or complex. Kanna sent them out in all directions, mixing herself in with the group.

"Is that your master plan?" Temari scoffed. "I'll give you credit I suppose for distributing yourself among the rabble, but my attack won't be easily negated!" Temari swung her giant fan in a burst right for where the real Kanna was. She backflipped away and skid across the ground. When the attack hit the ground, just missing her, it created a giant cloud of dust that covered the forest.

Temari didn't need to shield her eyes. Having lived in the desert her whole life, a small dustcloud like this was nothing, but it still caused her an annoyance. She lost Kanna.

She stayed alert in watching the clones around her disappear, taking with them any tail of chakra leading her to the girl. She closed her eyes, trying to sense any sound or movement from the other girl, but nothing came. Temari wasn't surprised. One thing she knew about Kiri shinobi was that they were among the best at stealth and sneaking up on an opponent.

Eyes widening, she leaned to the left, just as a fist cam flying through the dust cloud. Temari leaped off her branch, with Kanna in tow. Jumping backwards, Temari brought her fan up to block another punch, and she used her other arm to block an incoming kick. Temari landed on the ground, but the green haired girl was right behind her.

Kanna tried to flank Temari, but she kept the girl in front of her at all times. The girl was good and much more clevar than she let on, but Temari was a borderline genius.

Kanna went for a trip but Temari blocked it with her fan. Kanna smirked as she twisted her body in an unreal way and landed a kick in Temari's ribcage. Temari grimaced and Kanna took advantage again pressing the attack. She attacked with a flurry of punches and kicks either getting blocked or parried. Finally, Temari threw her fan forward, just missing Kanna. The fan continued to fly until it hit a few trees behind her. Seeing a relent in the other girl's attacks, Temari jumped backwards.

"This fight is over. You can't keep up with me! You may be much more powerful than me, but it doesn't matter if you can't hit me."

Temari spat, red mixing in with her saliva. "Don't underestimate me bitch. You see, I have another weapon." Kanna widened her eyes as Temari reached in her gear and brought out two smaller fans, wielding one in each hand. "I'll admit, your speed is impressive. Almost as impressive as that slut who beat me in the tournament. You took my weakness and created a favorable match up. So, I'll take advantage now."

Temari swung her small fan in her left hand and immidiately Kanna doubled over. A small, but powerful gust of air hit her in the stomach. Kanna got up to try and attack again, but another swing of the fan hit her in the knee and she collapsed on the ground.

"It's pointless. You see, I prefer the giant one because it doubles as both an offensive and defensive weapon."

Kanna looked up at her. I see, she gave up all her defense to only focus on attacking me. It must take more control, but if I can get close to her I can maybe win this. These air blows are precise, but weak. If I had more girth, I doubt they'd effect me much if at all. This is bad. My style is build around a small build able to contort myself and attack enemies where they can't see it coming, but her air bullets are so much faster. Lucien, how would you handle this? I can't give up. Somehow, I will win this

…

Kankouro glared at the shinobi looking at him from the trees. Meanwhile, Haku took this time to size up his opponent.

As a puppet master, he will both for attack and defense. The one he used earlier is his offense. I'm guessing that every needle and trap in that thing is poisonous. I doubt that other one has much in favor of offense at a distance, but if I get close it's certain to take me out. With my setup of jutsu and senbon, this is an unfavorable matchup.

Haku ran around the trees trying to get a clear shot at the Suna ninja, but every angle was watched and guarded. Jumping across the air, Haku thought he had a shot, but he had to decline it when the other puppet followed his every action. It shot 6 senbon laced with poison but Haku deflected them with the same amount of needles.

Landing on the ground, Haku widened his eyes when a giant mace sprouted from the puppet's mouth. Haku jumped backwards as the mace hit the ground, but recoiled back in Haku's direction. Haku danced backwards until his back hit a tree. As soon as he hit the tree, he placed an explosive tag on the tree and quickly danced to the side. The wrecking ball hit the explosive tag, it detonated causing the entire area to be a sea of bright white.

Kankouro used his puppet to shield his eyes from the blast, so his vision wasn't blurred. He scanned the area looking for the Kiri shinobi, but he couldn't find him anywhere. Looking around, he tried to look for any sign that the ninja was there but he couldn't find one.

"Clevar. Instead of an explosive tag, he used a simple flash tag. The one moment that my eyes were shielded he vanished. It doesn't matter to me though. My defense is much too strong."

"Confident," Haku said as he attacked Kankouro's face with a senbon. Kankouro used his defense puppet to block the attack, and then it opened up its mouth and hundreds of needles came out. Calmly, Haku jumped over the attack, but the other puppet came out of nowhere to attack him back. It's claws came out and attacked him head on/

Haku looked between the puppet master in the center, the offensive puppet to the right, and the defensive puppet the the left. He couldn't isolate a target. Haku felt a faint trickle of wetness along his cheek and Kankouro laughed.

"It's over. You're cut and you know what that means?"

"Yes, at this moment, poison is going through my body. As time passes my reaction time, speed, and power will decrease and my interal organs will begin to deteriorate. You have no need for offense now as time has shifted to your side."

Kankouro scowled. Even though the battle was won for him, the calm demeanor of this guy pissed him off.

"Of course you realize now that since I'm about to die, I have nothing to lose." Haku took out several scrolls of water and splashed it everywhere. "With this water, combined with the water in all of this forest, my attacks will be far more powerful."

Kankouro had his attacking puppet rush forward to impale Haku, but he disappeared in a puddle of water.

A water substitution, and with all the puddles around here he could be anywhere. No matter.

Kankouro pulled his puppets close to him in a defensive stance. Since he already had the advantage, he would force this guy to break him down.

"Secret jutsu, a thousand needles of death."

Kankouro looked up as a thousand ice needles appeared above him and crashed down on him. He had no chance to get away, so he used the extension of his defense puppet to create a canopy around him. Kankouro underestimated the force of the needles though. A crack began to appear on the canopy of his puppet.

The Suna shinobi located Haku, but he didn't have much time as he saw Haku finish a set of hand seals. "Water style, water bullet." Kankouro shifted his defense and again blocked the force of the jutsu. Kankouro looked around the clearing and he could begin to see the Kiri ninja begin to slow down. Haku stopped again and flew threw the hand seals of the simple jutsu to launch another water bullet. Kankouro was again able to stop the attack with his puppet, but he could feel something different. The force of the attack was significantly less than the last one.

He looked across the forest and saw the other shinobi breathing heavy. His legs shook, and he looked to be having a hard time seeing straight. Smiling, Kankouro pulled his puppets back to normal. Despite the minor damage taken to them by the water attacks, his puppets were still in good enough condition.

"Look at you! Just drop already and I can be on my way. Haku flashed through the hand seals again and fired another water bullet. This attack was far weaker, smaller, and slower than the other two shots Haku fired. Kankouro cockily moved his offensive puppet over to block the attack. After the droplets of water faded, Kankouro smiled further. Haku was breathing even harder. He dropped to one knee for a moment before standing back up in his stance. Weakly, Haku threw 3 senbon which hit the puppet and fell weakly to the ground.

"You just don't give up do you? Look, it's poison. Nobody can fight it once it's in the system. You will die and you're just embarrassing yourself."

Haku winced in pain. The trees around him began to spin and blur together, but he wouldn't give up. Hands shaking, he reached into his pack and withdrew six senbon and aimed three at each puppet. Kankouro shook his head at the foolishness of this. The shinobi was too weak to do anything so why throw senbon with not even enough force to stick. Waiting for the clink of the senbon harmlessly fall on the ground, Kankouro missed the smile on Haku's face. He raised an eyelash when he didn't hear the senbon fall. That look of confusion turned to horror when he saw the the senbon had imbedded themselves in both of his puppets.

And there were explosive tags attached to each senbon. Panicking, Kankouro flung his puppets as far away from him as possible. Looking back at Haku, his horrors furthered when he saw that Haku looked normal. "H-how? My poison?"

"You never hit me. During my flash bang, I cut my cheek with a senbon. It was a shallow cut, so shallow, that it wouldn't bleed for about thirty seconds after contact. From there, all I had to do was initiate a close call in which it looked like you hit me. After that, all I had to do was get you to do was think that I was under the effect of poison. I faked the entire thing. Now, with your puppets destroyed, it's time for me to finish this."

Haku ran towards Kankouro, but he wouldn't give up either and ran towards Haku with his fist cocked. He threw the punch, but Haku dodged it and buried senbon in both of Kankouro's arms and legs paralizing them.

The batter was finished. Kankouro couldn't move. Haku walked over to him and pulled the senbon out one by one. The other shinobi didn't feel a thing. "I only hit the pressure points, leaving you there in that state for about an hour. After that, you're free to leave."

"Why?"

"You don't deserve to die. While you are looking out for your village, you're also looking out for your brother. My job was to make sure you didn't get involved."

"But … if I can't get him out ..."

"That's our job. Naruto will handle this."

"You don't get it. He can't beat Gaara. Nobody can. Not with that ..."

"We know all about it and have taken preparations. Naruto won't lose. Trust me."

Haku turned away from Kankouro and looked in the distance to where Sasuke confronted Lucien. "Such evil chakra. I must help him." With that he took off, leaving the Suna ninja to think about everything. Eventually a fly came and landed on Kankouro's nose, itching it, but Kankouro couldn't do anything about it for an hour.

"Not cool."

…

A strong gust of wind forced Kanna back again. Her back hit against the tree hard and she had a tough time regaining her sense of direction. So far, every attempt to get close to the sand kunoichi proved to be pointless. She had to think of something or else she'd die for good.

Temari swiped her fan again. Kanna, realizing the danger jumped and hid around the tree that she fell back against. It was a desperate dodge, but she got away. She heard the wind hit the tree, but outside of that she didn't see or hear much splintering of the tree. Looking around, she saw that the attack left hardly a print on the tree itself which meant that the attacks were getting weaker.

Panting, Kanna pulled out a small sealing scroll of water from her pack and splashed it close to her and prepared hand seals quickly. Temari took the initiative and began moving in on Kanna from the side with her fans ready. Temari moved her fans as Kanna finished the seals. "Water style, water wall." Quickly rising from around her, the water came from the ground and surrounded her. The water was clear, and she could see that the wind attack from the other girl only managed to take a few drops away from the wall.

The wall would only keep her safe for a few moments, but in the ninja world, moments were everything. Temari didn't bother attacking the wall. She knew that the effort would be completely pointless and a waste of chakra. Temari smirked, knowing that every second Kanna planed behind her wall would be devestating for her chakra reserves. It also worked in her favor that every second that she planned, would be another second for Temari to think of ways to trap her as well.

She has no way to attack me, unless she gets close, but she's stuck behind that little wall of hers and can't move. As soon as that wall goes down, I'll throw everything I've got at her and finish this off.

Seconds passed quickly as Kanna began to lose control of her wall. In her time, she could only think of one strategy that could work, and if it failed she'd be done. She'd need a little luck for this to work, but if everything went according to plan, she'd be able to win the fight.

Kanna charged forward through the wall as if it were rain. Withought her chakra to hold the wall together, it was nothing more than a few drops of water. Temari didn't waste a moment, and swung her fans at Kanna. Temari expected Kanna to fly back, or drop to the ground, but was surprised when Kanna didn't slow down.

Temari quickly tried to get in a second attack, but Kanna was too quick, and sliced through her shoulder blade with a kunai. It wasn't enough to detach her arm, or even cause an injury that would cripple the other girl for the rest of her life, but it was enough to distract her enough to kick Temari in the stomach and stomp on her other wrist holing the small fans. Temari looked up at the girl with wide eyes.

"I figured it out. The winds from your attacks were used with a much smaller force and much less chakra. The winds would disperse into a gentle breeze if only something would make contact before the blast hit me. I saw from the tree and my shield that your attacks left no scar on anything and were significantly weaker than I thought. Then it occurred to me where you focused your attack. You focused on my stomach, knees, and arms, places on my body that would be left without any kind of blocker. In other words, all I needed to do was create my own blocker."

Temari looked to the ground near where Kanna charged and saw a fairly large scroll. "So, you threw the scroll to block the attack." Kanna nodded. She then turned her head back to where she knew Lucien was and frowned.

"He needs me. Something … bad is over there. Something evil. I can feel it."

Temari was confused. She didn't feel anything, and if she did, it would come from her brother and not anywhere. Was it part of the plan or was it something else? Whatever it was, from the concern on her face, Temari could tell that whatever caused the distraction was something very bad.

Kanna left to go help Lucien, but the scars of her battle with Temari took their tool. She was at a loss of breath, had very low chakra, chest on fire, limbs ached, and her water scrolls were gone. She didn't care though. All that mattered to her was helping out her boyfriend, because she knew that he was in deep trouble. Her connection with him started to get weaker and weaker, which meant that his life force was weakening quickly. Whatever caused it, she had to get over there fast or else, she, Lucien, and Haku would all die.

…..

And there it is. All this time and I still leave you all with a cliffhanger. Don't worry though, I promise you that I will update this story again before a year passes.

I've said it before and I'll say it now. I will finish this story. Even though I update as often as the Cubs win the World Series, I'll finish this story. Period.

Nothing much about this chapter. Just a couple of fights but they needed to happen. I'll have a little more story action next chapter. Mainly it's going to have Kushina, doing … stuff. I won't tell, but it's a key plot element. A bit of her past and so forth.

Thank you for reading

Next Chapter: The price of vengence

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